Video Games, Opinions, Thoughts, & Tomfoolery

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After (another) long hiatus the podcast is back. This time we’re talking a little bit of news, a lot of Mass Effect, and where Western RPGs have taken over where JRPGs have failed. My voice is a little hashed from bronchitis, but it’s not too bad (in case anybody actually noticed or cared). One thing you might notice is that we make the show more conversational and far less structured than it has ever been. If you do or don’t like the change, please let me know. As always, feedback is appreciated either in the comments section or by emailing me at jar155 [at] gmail dot com.

So last week it was announced that 3D Realms, the loooooooooong time developer of Duke Nukem Forever had finally ran out of cash and financial support and their projects had been canned. Duke Nukem Forever had been in development for twelve, yes TWELVE straight years, and that was easily the most notable title to get the axe. With the cancellation of the game, many screenshots and even some gameplay footage has been released by individual members of the development team. The game looked pretty good, but still far from finished. Anyway, as I was digging around in a few forums, I found a post on the Kombo.com General Gaming Discussion forum that gave some stats about the DNF development time. Check ‘em out:

Duke nukem forever was announced in 1997. Their was a list a few years back about 1997 and what happened since the game was announced.

In 1997, the fastest consumer internet connection was a 33.6 kbps modem.

When Duke Nukem Forever was announced, the fastest processor available to consumers was a 233Mhz Pentium.

Steve Jobs was still running NeXT when Duke Nukem Forever was announced.

In April of 1997, Google, eBay, and the term “weblog” didn’t exist.

Movies that were made during development

The entire Lord of the Rings trilogy, with extended editions.

All three Star Wars prequels.

Every Pixar movie aside from Toy Story.

Every movie, animation, and video game from The Matrix series.

Every Marvel comics movie released.

Each predictable twist ending of every movie by M. Night Shyamalan.

Britney Spears’ entire musical career as a pop star has taken place during Duke Nukem Forever’s development.

The entire cult following of Family Guy! Family Guy has debuted on FOX, been cancelled, entered syndication, been released on DVD, redebuted on FOX, and seen the release of a feature film.

The entire Harry Potter series as well as five movies.

The two Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity were proposed, authorized, announced, designed, launched and successfully landed upon Mars

The International Space Station was assembled and has been orbiting Earth for over 8 years.

The U.S.S. Ronald Reagan (the largest nuclear-powered aircraft carrier in the world) was in contract, built, launched, comissioned, and began active duty.

Things that took less time than DNF

The Beatles formed, released every single one of their albums and broke up. During this time they also toured the world several times.

The United States’ entire program to put a man on the moon, from Kennedy’s challenge to the landing.

The complete construction of many monumental buildings and engineering projects. To name a few-

The Empire State Building (Jan 1930 – May 1931)

The Channel Tunnel (Dec 1987 – May 1994)

The Golden Gate Bridge (Jan 1933 – May 1937)

The World Trade Center (Aug 1966 – April 1973

The American War for Independence

The United States Civil War

World War I

The United State’s involvement in the Vietnam War.

World War II and the entire Manhattan Project. Yes, even the complete development of the atomic bomb took less time.

Ouch. Now that’s a depressing headline, even if you’re not a big fan of Midway or their games. Yahoo! Finance has reported that in an attempt to cut costs and stay afloat, Miday has closed their Austin studio, layed off 25% of their staff, and canceled non-core projects. Basically Midway is like a computer in safe mode at this point. Here’s hoping that MK vs. DC can generate them some cash over the coming months…

I don’t like seeing all these developers struggle and go under. It’s a bad sign for the industry and a lot of good people are being layed off right and left. This isn’t something that’s going to end soon either, I know of a few more studios that are in deep financial trouble and will most likely be annoucing cuts and closures soon.

Over the next few days there won’t be much posting going on as I’m going to be up in Vancouver visiting EA Black Box for a Community Day event. I’m not sure what I can say yet, as I haven’t seen the NDA, but here’s hoping I can at least post some pics of the place. For those that have seen EA Black Box before, they can testify that the place is incredible.

Should I get a few minutes to do some updates at night, I might. We’ll see. No promises or anything.

Microsoft’s karaoke game is coming out in a little less than a month and today we were given the track listing for what songs will ship on the disc. A few selections are predictable, but the inclusion of stuff like Radiohead’s “Fake Plastic Trees” was a nice surprise. Oh wait, I’d never play a karaoke game, so what do I care? Anyway, here are the songs.

“Take on Me” by a-ha

“No One” by Alicia Keys

“Potential Break Up Song” by Aly & AJ

“Complicated” by Avril Lavigne

“Stand by Me” by Ben E. King

“Irreplaceable” by Beyoncé

“Call Me” by Blondie

“With You” by Chris Brown

“Yellow” by Coldplay

“Personal Jesus” by Depeche Mode

“Survivor” by Destiny’s Child

“White Flag” by Dido

“Mercy” by Duffy

“Hungry Like the Wolf” by Duran Duran

“Take Me Home, Country Roads” by John Denver

“Ring of Fire” by Johnny Cash

“Bleeding Love” by Leona Lewis

“Lip Gloss” by Lil’ Mama

“Superstar” by Lupe Fiasco (featuring Matthew Santos)

“Makes Me Wonder” by Maroon 5

“In Bloom” by Nirvana

“Young Folks” by Peter Bjorn and John

“Another One Bites the Dust” by Queen

“The One I Love” by R.E.M.

“Fake Plastic Trees” by Radiohead

“I Wanna Be Sedated” by The Ramones

“Stand” by Rascal Flatts

“Umbrella” by Rihanna

“Listen to Your Heart” by Roxette

“Love Song” by Sara Bareilles

“Soak Up the Sun” by Sheryl Crow

“I’m Only Me When I’m With You” by Taylor Swift

“Walk Like an Egyptian” by The Bangles

“Over My Head (Cable Car)” by The Fray

“ABC” by The Jackson 5

“Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic” by The Police

“Love in a Trashcan” by The Raveonettes

“Ladies Love Country Boys” by Trace Adkins

“Island in the Sun” by Weezer

“Bust a Move” by Young MC

I can’t wait to see the first video of some dorky emo kid busting out Avril Lavigne’s “Complicated” while pretending the whole time he doesn’t like it.

IGN has all the details, so check out the source link at the end for their full writeup. Anyway, Rock Band 2 is coming in September to the Xbox 360 and is going to be a timed exclusive. I don’t know how long PS3 and Wii owners will have to wait to get the game, but Harmonix is saying that it should be later this year. I have a hard time believing that it will miss the early holiday shopping season, but it depends on what Microsoft has worked out with EA. Also, the game will support the use of Rock Band 1 DLC tracks, something that the Guitar Hero fellas haven’t figured out yet.

I’m pretty excited for RB2 to come out, but I really hope that they can make a big step forward without having to introduce gimmicks. I’m still a big Guitar Hero fan, but I don’t like some of the “improvements” they’ve made along the way *cough* boss battles *cough*. With such a short time frame until release, I’m sure we’ll know all about RB2’s track and feature lists soon. Keep your eyes and ears open during E3…

Gamevideos has some new gameplay videos up of SSFII Turbo HD Remix. Check ‘em out below.

Looking good, huh? If you download Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3 for XBLA, you can get a free invite to the beta for this game. The only problem is, by all accounts, Commando 3 is downright horrible. Still, SFII is always worth a little pain.